School.

It's late. Kiddos are in bed. I'm lonely. Just got done studying.

What could you possibly do to make mom-life harder? Get a full time job and/or go to college at the same time. What could make that harder? Doing it at home with your littles underfoot.

Why oh why didn't I take the BLUE pill?

Sometimes, I truly feel pathetic. I second guess everything I've ever done. I graduated high school at 17, great GPA, decent ACT scores, and headed to a private university (they certainly think they're awesomesauce . . . can you say $$$$$) just after turning 18. Now I've made my choices. Here I am. I'm 22, haven't held a regular job in 3 years, eeking by to hopefully finish my 2 year degree before 23.

Then I go and look in at those two beautiful girls. I walk out of their room and pass the portrait of my Marine on the wall. There are toys all over the floor, used dishes in the sink, leftovers from a good meal on the counter, and a pile of dirty clothes (still) sitting in a hamper.

What the HELL is wrong with me? I have nothing to complain about. Seriously. I have nothing to want. This is far from being pathetic. I sincerely hope no one pities me. If you are you're wasting your time.

So here's a better perspective. I'm only 22. I all ready have an incredible marriage of three years to my best friend in the universe. We've made these two amazing little humans (the most amazing in the world in my humble mommy opinion). I have done all I can to bring in extra money (babysitting, ebay, paper route anyone?). Even though I could drop out now I haven't and even thought a 2 year degree has taken me 4.5 years I'm going to get it. (By all means, I might just take a stab at getting my 4 year degree.) I supported my husband as he pursued his dream of becoming a United States Marine. Rather than accumulate more debt staying in a private school I dropped out until I could afford it.

It may seem out of order. It's definitely harder. But I'll be damned if anyone convinces me this isn't the best story.

Certainly, there is no better legacy I can create than the two sleeping babes on the other side of this wall. There is no better creation, no wiser investment, no richer return.

Sometimes I have to remind myself why I'm in school. I'm doing this for me. I actually love to learn and if it was free I'd probably stay in school until I die. But, I'm also doing this for them. They need to know what they're capable of doing. Who better to show them than their own parents?

So there you have it. My next to last semester at this school has begun. I'm keeping fingers crossed I can kill these courses, transfer to an online program, and get my bachelor's. Meanwhile, my man is out in a field somewhere being amazing. Our two princesses are in their warm beds.

Note to self: I'd take the red pill again just like that.

Fingerpainting Pinterest Craft!

This was FUN. And, it was EASY.

Here is the original.

I didn't use canvas or regular finger paint. We used crayola color wonder paper and finger paint.

I fixed up letters with blue painter's tape and put that over the paper then just let them have at it. A spare piece of cardboard I keep for things like this meant I didn't even need to wipe up the floor (much).




 Notice the cute toes of an eager toddler. I frustrate her muchly when I'm trying to get pictures of anything like this. She's always ready to get on with it!

 I barely let it dry for 10 seconds before taking the paint off. The nice thing about the crayola paint stuff is that it doesn't really drip and it dries fast anyway.

FIN!

It's kind of adorable. I didn't get any pictures of the actual painting, sadly. They need some serious refereeing when it comes to art and craft supplies. If I could just give them an empty white room and all the paint, markers, and crayons imaginable there'd likely be no space untouched. Think the inside of Rapunzel's tower in Tangled. haha Definitely . . . .

So there you have it! I'll either frame it for their room or put it in the "keep" folder for the kid-art scrapbook I honestly intend to put together someday.

Our At-Home Read-to-Me Summer Reading Mission

Because mission sounds cooler than "program" or "goal" . . . .

I was too late looking into a summer reading program of some sort for my kiddos (primarily, the toddler).   They both (at the ripe old ages of 28 and 10 months) love books anyway but I want to keep encouraging (err . . . bribing? possibly?) that love.  They're to little yet to be reading to themselves in a legitimate manner. My 2 year old will hunker down in her bed looking at multiple books for minutes. (And anyone with a 2 year old knows that minutes are awesome units of time. 2 minute time out. 10 minutes to bed. 30 minute "rest". Just a minute.)

Since taking on more classes and having all of the household duties on my shoulders while my Marine has been gone I've totally slacked on reading. After putting them into their beds the other night I grabbed a book on trains and sat in the floor and read to them. All the jabbering, the attempts at distracting themselves from much needed sleep, and the occasional shrieking death-howls were put to an end as I began to quietly start into the first paragraph. The parrot-like toddler clung to my words and the baby stared sleepily through crib slats at the colorful pictures -- both mesmerized.

**Hello, dummy (thinking to myself) why you no read more?! Dang it! LE SIGH**
(yes, I've started thinking "le sigh" as a term inside my head. i just did it again. ugh.)


Anyway, this sparked a last minute search for a program for them. Perhaps something with an award system exists?

Blah.

Too late for most things. Some info was far too vague. Others were aimed to the 4+ crowd.

I decided to devise a plan to keep me engaged with a goal of reading MORE. Now, I'm not going from reading 0 books to 2-3, personally. We're going from reading 4-5 times (minimum of two DIFFERENT books, if I'm lucky) a day to aiming more for 10. Given the longevity of most children's books, this is really only a minimum of 30 minutes (3 per book) and anywhere up to a couple conglomerate hours of reading.

When's the best time to read to them?

Whilst the toddler is on the mini-potty; before nap and bedtime; during lunch or breakfast; whenever the TV quota is met (heh heh); anytime at all.


First stop: LIBRARY. (the Rogers Public Library, to be exact)

We have a TON of books. TONS. We've read them all multiple times. ALL. Multiple. Yes.

So I found a couple I'd never read and a couple I remember reading when I was little. We went through all of them moments after returning home from the library the other day and we've read them many times since.

This is great.


BUT . . . I suck. SO . . . I need visual reminders.

Maybe a piece of paper on the door? Boring.

A list on the fridge? So 1990s.

Sticky note on the computer with a running list of read and un-read books? Yeah, right. Like I'd keep it up. hahaha

OOO!!

Pretty colors. Construction paper + Scissors = Strips of Rainbow

That's all fine and dandy. I'll write the titles and authors on each strip as we read. I can totally glue them to another sheet of paper and hang it up on the fridge or an obvious wall space.

(The boring police are flickering their annoying LED lights now.)









Hey look . . .

A cup sitting on the shelf being totally lazy and unhelpful. TO WORK it goes! I'll stick strips of paper with book titles into the vase as we read. Our mission: fill it until it's full.

This is our At-Home, Read-to-Me Summer Reading thingy.

So, there ya have it. 5ish more weeks until I'm back to my courses. Hopefully we can get the vase FULL of  slips. By using the library, I can decide which books I want access to on our shelves at home,  which I prefer to avoid, and which were sufficient

Another thought: for older kids assign a monetary value to each slip. 25 cents. Don't be crazy. If you read 20 books that's . . . money. Calculate it yourself. It's late and I've had a long day.



Now GO! Motivate your kiddos to be nerdy little bookworms instead of nerdy little computer viruses!

Tanyard Creek Trail + a Hello

There's been NO extra time for this blog with all we've had going on.

#1 MY HUSBAND (mine, my man!!) is now a United States Marine. That's right. With a heck of a lot of determination, support from my family and our friends, and lots of hand written letters we BOTH made it  through the crazy three months of boot camp. He graduated Private First Class. I didn't die. Pretty awesome. There were lots of obstacles for both of us -- mental, physical, emotional -- but we did it. He graduated from Parris Island at the end of June. The whole experience has been pretty incredible.

In other news, if you're looking to go back to school I need to recommend looking into NWACC. Northwest Arkansas Community College has been pretty amazing for me. If there are no surprise bumps in the road I'll graduate from there next year with my associate's degree. Best part: It's ALL been online. I had a lot of support there while my husband was gone (he left in the middle of spring semester and I started a couple of summer classes before he was done). It's honestly got to be one of the best opportunities for people going back to school, with family's, or with other important obligations (military or full time job or stay at home mama for example). I just have to slide that recommendation in there.


In more recent, less crazy . . . I did some googling trying to find something fun and FREE for us to do around here on a Sunday. Eureka Springs is on our list of places we want to go back to but gas + food + spending money wasn't going to fit into our budget. We've been to the new art museum in Bentonville once, kids in tow. Um, no. Not doing that again. We'd all ready been to the drive-in and the same feature was showing as before. The pool at our complex was crawling with teenagers. No thanks. Anyway, I did some googling. Honestly I don't remember how I came across it but there was a link for a nature trail in Bella Vista. Oh ok, quaint little walk. Why not?

Who knew THIS was in Bella Vista?

Whoever did know, you totally suck for not telling me. There is a simple route but there's also an easy hike of about 2 miles with lots of overlooks, a couple waterfalls, and plenty of swimming holes. Beware, we definitely saw at least one cottonmouth and one copperhead sunning. Don't let them stop you from seeing this hidden Arkansas site though.

If you take the main Bella Vista exit (town center) going north turn left and keep driving. It's on the left near a set of little homes and a golf course. You should be able to see a sign for "Tanyard Creek Nature Trail". There's a parking lot, picnic tables, restrooms, and even a dog water station. (Yes, it's also good-dog friendly. Dogs on leashes who are cleaned up after are totally welcome. Our new pup enjoyed himself.)

Total win.

We're looking forward to going back this fall after some rain has filled the creeks back up.

I make fun of Arkansas all the time but sometimes the Natural state shows me a thing or two.

<3

Potty Training

We have been super busy around here with things.

I thought I'd take the time to post about our potty training plan though.

For starters, we bought a potty for N when she was younger than 12 months to get her used to it. I would occasionally let her sit on it when I was going. She was very proud of herself. She even peed a couple times. I went back and forth with myself on whether to really put effort in as we got closer to my due date with little E. N was about 16-18 months old, we were moving, and I'd read about regressions so I didn't push too hard. Although, I would've loved to be at least partially done with diapers at the time. Well, now she is 25 months. She had made some progress with our very relaxed, keep the potty in the living room, and give her a little candy if she decided to go on her own method. She did regress shortly after E's birth as I expected so I'm actually glad I didn't overdo it.

At this point, she is done with diapers, apparently. For one, she prefers to be nude 24/7. It's nearly impossible to keep her in a diaper or pull up at nap time let alone during the day. She also started calling them "baby pants" or "E's pants" and pretty much outright refuses to voluntarily lie down for a change as she has for the longest time. Oh no, she wants to be a little nudist.

For two, she has started very clearly letting me know when she thinks she needs to go. It doesn't matter if it's #1 or #2 she has shown a lot of awareness and will at least try to get the diaper/pants/underwear/dress up skirt off before she needs to go.

For three, she can communicate. She knows what the potty is and what it is for. She knows that she has a potty chair in the main area and a ring for the big toilet in the bathroom. She knows how to pull the little bucket out of the chair and dump it in the big potty. She knows how to remove and replace the potty ring on it's little hook at the side of the big toilet. She knows to go, wipe, flush, then wash her hands. I still help her a lot on all these points. We have a little stool for her but it is too small so she still needs help getting to the sink. Besides, she'd sit there and play in the water all day if I allowed her to do it all alone anyway.

So, with all of this. It's obviously about that time. Time to potty train. Since when do I have a toddler anyways?

I did a "Test run" several days ago to see how she'd do with a reward system. Um, awesome. Stickers for sitting on the potty and a big prize (a little thing of sparkly nail polish) for going potty and staying dry for a day.

This is going to be my system. I made up a chart. We'll buy stickers and pullups (for nap and bed, she'll wear them if there are princess on them . . .diva) tomorrow. For every time in a day she goes she gets to put a sticker up on her chart. For every FULL day she does well (day does not include nap or night time) she gets a coloring page! Amazing how very easily excited 2 year olds are by coloring. For this part I've printed several pages following a potty theme. (I'll share some of them via the links at the end) THEN, for every 7 days (or a week, but not necessarily consecutive) she goes to the potty and stays dry she gets a "big prize". I have 7 weeks on the chart with a variety of "big prizes" that steadily get more "valuable". Week 1 is new nail polish. Week 2 is a coloring book (yay dollar store!). Week 3 is a book (the potty book). Week 4 is NEW underwear she can pick out herself. Week 5 is a trip to get frozen yogurt. Week 6 is a trip to Chick-fil-a to eat and play. Week 7 we'll make a big cookie and go to build a bear (not something I'd normally go for BUT we have gift cards all ready) and she will get a "BIG GIRL" certificate which I will make up and print out. 

This may sound over the top to some but I don't care. In my head, I will be celebrating so much that I want to throw a party for the universe.

So there you have it. That's my plan.

We'll see how it goes. In 2 weeks I have finals. In 7-8 weeks we'll be doing a lot of traveling.

*fingers crossed*

Here's those pages I printed:

Blue's Clues
Hand washing
Toilet paper
Pull Ups
Baby on the Potty

P.S. Parent Bonus: You can keep the little chart, the coloring pages, and put it together with some pictures of your toddler on the potty to make a little booklet. PERFECT for embarrassing them later. Show off your kiddo's skills to all their hot dates!